BOISE, ID – Mexico’s Emilio Gonzalez dazzled the Korn Ferry Tour with a sparkling final round 61 to win the golf tournament, but the whole city of Boise won the Albertsons Boise Open. Indeed, the final chapter of the Korn Ferry Tour regular season was a rip-roaring success on every level, especially seeing as how organizers had to pull off not one, but three concerts at the same time on the same property and did so with the sleight of hand of master magicians.
Jeff Sanders and his team at Jeff Sanders Entertainment certainly won this week. For the 37th consecutive time the Albertsons Boise Open went off without a snip, snipe, or sour note. For years, the Boise tour stop has been the gold standard on the Korn ferry Tour, both in organization and energy. It truly feels like a Korn Ferry major. Everyone, from players to spectators to industry, marveled at how well all the gears meshed to keep operations absolutely flawless. Jeff signed a three-year deal with the Tour earlier this year, so it’s believed that both Albertsons and the Tour are locked in at least through what will ultimately be Year 40 and likely beyond. More impressive, Sanders managed to hold 15,000 person concerts on the same site immediately after each day’s play, first Darius Rucker (in his country incarnation), then Lynyrd Skynyrd, then Osbourne Brothers. Ground transport rolled with the clockwork precision of Italian trains. The transition was seamless and crowd control handled crisply.
The city of Boise certainly won. Our high desert oasis shone with its most glorious radiance in the dappled sunshine. Surrounded on all sides by mountains! The verdant Beltway and the glimmering Boise River, where player after player soothed their post round aches with a peaceful river float! The bourgeoning restaurant scene where suddenly one James Beard winner pops up after another! The city’s safety – voted by many polls as the safest city in the United States! And is actually listed in the top seven or eight worldwide. Prosperity, security, civility, this is the American Dream realized. And the neighborliness of the denizens, who show up at new neighbors’ doors with picked asparagus from their garden and get invited in for Bloody Marys made with the new arrival’s fresh tomatoes: Boiseans are good to each other and the love shows. Indeed, it shines, it radiates like the high desert sunshine.
Oh, we had plenty of that. It wasn’t just the crucible of Korn Ferry Tour pressure that heated things up, though that was considerable as well. After all, some players were going home for the season after this week…and some may be going home to new forever professions. Such is life on the knife’s edge. Will you ascend to the Big Time or will the good buddy you’ve known since junior golf tour? The drama makes for riveting theatre. Boise sure delivered that.
Take effervescent Canadian Etienne Papineau. He looked lost and forlorn after an opening 72, but a blistering 64 turned that frown upside down and for the next two days the energy between himself and the fans was palpable. Playing with a renewed joie d’esprit, he closed 67-68 at 13-under. We’ll see him again in Nashville three weeks from now when the playoffs begin.
Or perhaps Davis Chatfield, hopefully soon to be the first graduate of Notre Dame to play on the PGA Tour. What a great day for his home town of North Attleboro, no longer just a mere shadow of mighty Boston. What a great day for every Fighting airish fan and now their unshakeable fervor and inimitable passion will be all over the PGA Tour.
And the kid is a perfect reflection of it. Gritty and gutsy. He fought his way through two lackluster early rounds to surge up the leaderboard Saturday with a smooth 65. Another 68 to close put him in at 16-under and in a tie for 15th.
“I did a lot of good this week. Just a lot of solid golf; I didn’t do anything crazy. I made a lot of progress, and I hung in there” he assessed earnestly. “The course is awesome. It’s always a treat to come here. We had great weather and the course was in fantastic condition. And wow, the last three holes, what an environment, especially on 16. You so wanna birdie one of those last three.”
And that brings up two more enormous winners this week: the grounds crew and the membership. No one could complain about the conditioning of the golf course. The turf was fast and firm, but not desiccated. The greens were glass-smooth and all the wonderful green contours that are the beating heart of Hillcrest Country Club came alive with all their micromovement and accordant intricacies. Are these the best greens in Boise? The make a strong case for it.
And the members came out in force. Everywhere at once, beaming with pride at their club and its illustrious heritage. Far from being the stereotypical fuddy-duddy, over the hill geriatric or snooty country club gentrified elitist, many of the members are young and full of vitality, with young women and kids are more than well represented.
They were rewarded with swashbuckling golf, particularly at the end. Jeffrey Kang made a stellar birdie on 18 to cut the lead to one as the tournament finished, but could not catch Gonzalez, who opened his round eagle-birdie-birdie and closed birdie-eagle-birdie-par. Kang’s finished one shot back of Gonzalez at 21-under. Belgium’s Adrien Dumont de Chassart finished tied for third with American and former PGA Tour star Russell Knox two shots back at 20-under.
“I’ve been playing really well the last few weeks, and what a wonderful crowd and golf course. It was really fair; you hit good shots you get rewarded with birdied and if you hit bad shots, you get bogeys,” he explained. “I grew up at a course that had a lot of dog legs, and it really made you learn to shape the ball, and it also had very slopey greens so you had to learn how top putt as well, and that helped me really enjoy this course and play well here.”
For some, the week was a victory lap and a coronation. Christos Lamprecht may have gone the wrong way Sunday with a 71 and a 2/14 performance hitting fairways, but I’m positive no man is a loser when he can walk off 18 into the arms of his fiancé, Annalisa. The sme is true for Niccolo Galletti, whose closing 63 was good for a T-7 finish. He too, walked off the green into the loving arms of his fiancé.
“I hit almost every single fairway today besides the first, and my putting was good,”: he noted post-round. “Putting it in position to attack let me capitalize on my putting.”
The he encapsulated the week, essentially for all the players.
“It‘s been a great week. The people here are so awesome. “They got so behind me for the entire week, and that made so much of a difference. It’s a huge boost. I’m so glad to play here.”
But that’s the biggest victory for Boise. Our infectious energy, our limitless kindness for one another, and our pride in our clean, safe, civilized city is the gold standard in America, not just on the golf tour. And with Jeff Sanders leading the way, the Boise Open will continue to be a de facto Korn Ferry major for decades to come. $3,000,000 raised for charity. Every day all 15,000 tickets were sold out. Sunday was Junior Golf Day. Sanders, his team, the Hillcrest members, and all Boise pulled together. And all golf is better for it.
